Update on slaying of priest

On October 4, in my round-up of Salvadoran blogs, I mentioned the slaying of Catholic priest Ricardo Antonio Romero. The two operative theories were the possibility that Fr. Romero was killed by gangs or killed by death squads for his political views.

It now appears that it was neither. A suspect has been arrested and has confessed to the killing for "sentimental reasons." It also appears that Fr. Romero was in state of great intoxication earlier in the day. The circumstances surrounding the death has lead to the arcbishop of San Salvador, Saenz-Lacalle, to apologize to the faithful for the instance of immorality in the clergy.

The circumstances surrounding this murder highlight a regular problem for trying to understand El Salvador. Anytime a person is murdered who has progressive political views, or is associated with an organization on the left, there are those who are quick to jump to the assertion that a "death squad" was involved. I admit to falling into this trap myself after the slaying in 2005 of the watchman at the Salvadoran Lutheran University. It turns out that this gruesome slaying was committed by a criminal band orchestrated by the other watchman at the university.

I have no doubt that death squads are operating in El Salvador. They are engaging in vigilante justice and "social cleaning," performing executions of suspected gang members. But I have not yet seen the proof that death squads are currently operating against political opponents. Why should they? ARENA has been in ascendancy for the past 15 years and the FMLN is politically weak. Political murders don't make sense in the current environment.

To me it is very curious that the inept police suddenly appears with suspect, taking into consideration the place where the priest was killed this should've been another case of "police too ill-equipped to do anything to solve a crime". This gang-banger dude is far too convenient, and his allegations that "I was very drunk, he (the priest) tried to make me do something I didn't like, so I reacted like that and killed him" are absurd. Therefore, I do not take what LPG and the propagandistic media says about the case, until some respectable forensic investigation is held and released to public.

About threats/death squads happening during the 90s, and the cispes details a recent one:http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGAMR290151996?open&of=ENG-SLVhttp://72.14.209.104/search?q=cache:pM93QWAElgcJ:www.uscis.gov/graphics/services/asylum/ric/qa_pdfs/QASLV99-001.pdf+El+Salvador:+%22Sombra+Negra%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=3http://www.cispes.org/english/Communiques_-_Action_Alerts/index.html

About mafias in the political spheres:http://www.diariocolatino.com/nacionales/detalles.asp?NewsID=13949http://www.diariocolatino.com/nacionales/detalles.asp?NewsID=9956http://www.tulane.edu/~latinlib/RESTRICTED/El_Salvador_Watch/1996_10.txt

I believe that death squads, hitman, can always come into operation to intimidate any opposition into "complying" with a party's agenda. To stop any serious investigation that could make public the vast corrupt webbing in the country and reveal the participants. Or even as in one of the links I added on the top, even due to political party in-fighting.

You must remember that death squads came into operation even at times where the repressive government was in total control, all to take down potential threats and intimidate any future oposition. That is why I do believe that this priest being killed as he was is far too convenient, because now there won't be any investigations and they'll just go with the "gang member's" testimony (when said person can't really be trusted in the first place). I call this recent articles misdirection.

Kind of reminds me when the movie "The Crime of Father Amaro" was under the eye of the catholic community in El Salvador, some people wanted to ban it from displaying in the local cinemas.Well, surprise, there were Amaros living among them !!Now, killing should not be a punishment ...

Everyone in ES has their own agenda which might include taking the credit or placing the blame for such horrific actions as the murder of a priest. It's likely that the real perpetrators/motives will ever be known. However, you can be sure that ARENA will use it to justify further oppression. I am no expert on ES, as I have only been there twice as a volunteer. But it does seem to me to be less stable there now than it was even a year ago.

It's laughable and amazing how fast they were able to arrest the "murder".

It's ridiculous how the suspect appears to be enjoying his "15 minutes of fame" in front of tv cameras and news people.

I don't believe his the real killer. They probably paid him to say what he said and to take blame.. later on he'll be released, you'll see. Not that I'm God, nor I see the future or anything like that; it's just that I know ARENA well, and I'm not stupid to believe their lies and smoke courtains anymore.

If the inept police is capable of solving a crime that fast, where are the killers of the Manzanares? Where are the murders of the FMLN activist couple killed a few weeks ago?

Where is Belloso too? ah! he was another smoke courtain paid by ARENA; that's why ARENA archived and forgot about his case. Belloso was kind of a "auto-gol" that ARENA did in order for them to gain public support for the anti-terror law. ARENA KILLED THOSE 2 COPS, NOT BELLOSO (I think that he is abroad and enjoying with the money that ARENA paid him to appear with a riffle infront of the UES; I think ARENA gave him papers with a new name and money to start a new life, probably in the US)

"If the inept police is capable of solving a crime that fast, where are the killers of the Manzanares? Where are the murders of the FMLN activist couple killed a few weeks ago?"

Forget those POLITICALLY MOTIVATED cases ;)

If the nation's police was ANY GOOD, we wouldn't be having 12-14 murders a day. Where are the criminals? Normally the are free. Even with those MIRACLE raids our dumb coppers do, they are later forced to liberate the majority of em because they don't have any proof of them commiting a crime...

So I ask the people, if our police is already ill-equipped, is filthy as in filled with corruption, is badly trained, doesn't count with advanced forensic equipment and training... How the hell did the capture this marero so quickly? When the guy was murdered, the place was isolated, no ocular witness, no nothing. Suddenly this marero appears, and the PROPAGANDA MACHINE in the country that is severely biased and only smears and attacks the left, doesn't report on the corrupt members of ARENA and such, appears with this peace of news? Were is the investigation? Nowhere.

Samuelooser, all you have to say are assumptions, nothing concrete, nothing justified. Instead of filling your mouth with assumtioms and spitting them with rage, why don't you make and investigative analysis and try to get into a conclusion. You seem to have some education, use it wisely and rationally. Or am I mistaken and you are just another Salvadoran full of resentment towards a working class that made it up to the top with effort?.

"Salvadoran full of resentment towards a working class that made it up to the top with effort?."

Normally said people have made it up to the top outside of the USA. Or like Silva Pereira with help of the ARENA NACROTRAFFIC-MAFIA.

Heh, ARENA members have done nothing of their own merit to amass their fortunes: coffee plantaitions purchase soldiers with the money they brought from the old world to execute indians and subdue them to cheap manual labor. It is out of the spine of laborers them oligarchs have made their fortune. And in business? They've illicitly priviatized the different national institutes to always the same group (themselves) and lead to series of monopolies. Let us not forget about the bucrocracy them ARENA loves to mantain so it is hard for new business to come here and protect themselves... Oh, and why even mention of how the minimum wage sucks ass with a more expensive life? Truth of the matter, is that the working class has MADE the death squad sponsored, money laundering, drugdealing mafia known as ARENA.

And with all the web of corruption and fraude that is impossible to break thanks to PCN's control of the Corte de Cuentas, it is neigh impossible to prosecute Domenech, Hill, Siman, Poma, Calderon, Sol, Escalon, Cristiani, Flores.

Just as you people may get an example... Carlos Perla stole millions right? He went to France, and our damn NON-gobernment didn't order his capture and deportation to El Salvador, because...

HE REVEALED THAT HE HAD BUILT FRANCISCO FLORES A LAGOON IN HIS RANCH USING ANDA EQUIPMENT AND FUNDS. WTF!? That is why they didn't bring him back here, or he would've either managed to REVEAL THE PARTICIPANTS OF THE MASS WEBBING OF CORRUPTION ALL OF EM VINCULATED TO ARENA, or he would've ended dead by an ARENA hitman.

So yes, whatever TCS and DH, LPG say is BS. Because they are propaganda machine of the MAFIA that rule our country. They smear and alter history to satisfy the agenda of their leaders. Come on, they baptize the military as saviors of the country, and D'buisson as a "HERO". When anyone that knows peep of our history would understand the ARMY IS THE GREATEST TRAITORS OF OUR NATION, involved with more than 30 thousand deaths, and that now some of their ex-members and ex-escuadroneros operate as the GANGS we have now. And D'buisson was mastermind and participant of the death squads and is linked to Monsignor's Romero's death.

So it is rat-ass easy to not report certain news: like Carmen Elena Siman Dada de Jaar linked to a colombian mafia cartel and involved in money laundering, or about the truths of our past, and always blaming and attacking the left with lies: the terrorist actions like the bombing of SISA and another Cristiani target which was related to party in-fighting between extremes, they tend such things to FMLN.

So it is easy for ARENAZI, let us say... kill Joe. Then announce on the news papers that he was drugged and a homosexual that was gun down by mareros because Joe refused to pay them for the heroin he bought from them. They can print and emit that same news every single day until people believe it is true. When the truth could be that Joe was an ARENA insider that was about to reveal to the public the list of 20 names of ANEP-ARENA members involved in armsdealing, money laundering, narcotraffic.

Unfortunately, because ARENA controls the police, the Corte Suprema de Justicia, Corte de Cuentas, said testimony in the first place wouldn't done anything. The propaganda machine would start slandering Joe, marginalizing him, and ARENA hiring hitman to murder him, either directly from the maras, or some of ther "confidence people"(ex-escuadroneros behaving as bodyguards). And THEN, due to the insesant crime rate ARENA has refused to control, because it benefits them, they coult attribute this death as another "gang related" crime...

See how it works? You cannot trust the press in here, when it is 100% controlled by the mafia in power.

The press 100% went along with the Terror Campaignt hat stole the 2004 elections from Handal, going on and on, that said USA thug said that "If FMLN wins, we will deport all of em suckas in USA, and our relations with El Salvador will strain", or the Taiwanese mafiosos going on about how they'll "lose their privileges if ARENA doesn't win, and they'll be forced to close down and leave".

And all of this in the same exact period of the elections. You didn't see the suckers at the press say that them foreigners where meddling in our democratic process, and condemn them for doing so. No, they were drummer boys that impulsed the terror campaign for ARENA in press and tv. That is how ARENA won the votes, by terror and smearing Handal as a terrorist, when curiously enough according to the UN Truth Commission, ARENA-PCN sponsored the so called government was related with 96% of the human rights violatins, and have as of now a supreme record of human rights violatins.

BUT, now that Venezuela wants to do business in Central America, not related with the NARCO-MAFIOSOS (ARENA and members of the UPLA) that would surely steal the profit from the cheap oil, or get it cheap but not sell it cheap, what does the press do? Smear this move as a political move to sway public opinion towards the left (as if the suck country state, ARENA lies weren't enough to do so... but people don't vote against them because they are brainwahsed and terrorized by the propaganda machine).

See? They clap and chear what their mafia leaders do, but condone everything and anything the opposition does as some attempt to desistabilize an already VOLATILE AND DEFINATELY UNSTABLE country, or an attempt to get votes.

And Lacalle? He is no Romero, he is another Papal Pawn, like the ones that existed prior to the war that were in favor of mantaining the status quo in favor of the rich, and get the poor to pay them limosnas, and serve their leaders, just like the priest you see in the video I'll post below calling on his cell-phone with a big-ass ring and smiling... being a conspirator behind the 2002 coup that the narco-mafiosos in Venezuela led against Chavez. Also notice there how the propaganda machine ALWAYS bend the news and lie to the public to protect the interests of the mafia:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5832390545689805144

And as some folks said in another post, this specific priest was REMOVED from the Soyapango? Cathedral because he conflicted with the people in control (mafia and associates) due to his views.

Yes, definately you can't trust the slanted and corrupt news. It is as if every single channel/press were a FOX NEWS OR a CNN. But worse, because in Latin America, people are greater thieves politics being always waged in favor of 5% of the "ruling class" of the regions.

Yes. Lacalle is just like them Vatican priests that helped Nazi fugitives escape along with their gold to Argentina. They'll be happy as long as they get a grant... That is why unless you are a good priest and or liberation theologian, then undoubtedly you are an "opium of the masses" who are exploited and cheated by NON-GOVERNANCE. You can't say it is government when the top players don't respect the law and go on with impunity, and all law are made in favor fo the minority.

Put it this way, Hill stole MILLIONS. Those millions that he stole in a limited period of time is equals to what the common thieves in the country would be able to steal in 5 years of operation. Was Hill prosecuted? Not really, and he wasn't even forced to pay up. The government did, he is now residing in Panama in an hacienda purchased with money he stole from El Salvador and transferred first to Caiman Islands and then banished...

By the way, regarding the TERROR moves USA used to meddle and destroy the democratic process of our nation just like a virgin that is raped...

What is the environment in USA right now? Anti-immigrnats, states have imposed anti-immigrant laws, there've been raids arresting immigrants, a fence is being built, people speak of no "amnesty", of making stricter migracion policy.

So ARENA didn't do ANYTHING.

With the Taiwanese? Multiple sweatshops closed down and moved to Nicaragua and China, or any other country with cheaper labor.

And our "glorious" police that have enough moxy and are efective as a flatulence combating crime... Where to start:

Our police because are underpaid, unequipped, ill trained, not counting with the forensic technology and techniques to give a serious investigation, have in them rings of corrupt officers... have some ex-cuadroneros in them, and have also been involved with Sombra Negra...

Well, Rodrigo Avila who has also been involved in Sombra Negra and was already head of the PNC, is linked to a private security enterprise, like bunch of them ARENAZIs. Doesn't this represent a conflict of interests?

Ask yourself, why if we are out of war, is our national police force so ill financed and equipped to fulfill its duty, but the army has an 106 million yearly budget (which by the way should've been abolised and every one of them trialed for crimes against humanity against ARENA and USA thugs) is one of the best financed institutes of the country?

-ARENA, the narcotrafic mafia benefit from the gangs in multipleways:-drug dealing. From Ilopango and elswhere ARENA members receive drug cargo, distrubute to mareros to sell, and they then give money to ARENA to launder.-By not providing security, it creates the notion that the only alternative for public safety is the army... here comes remilitarization. In fact, in some rural communities (where really gangs actually act mostly in urban areas) police and army have been raiding.-There is talks by PCN, a second face of the ARENA mafia and been controlling the Corte De cuentas, about stablishg a regime of state of exception.-Anti-terrorist law....

See?

Not mentioning, that since 1940 Costa Rica abolished the army and has not experienced a civil war since, and has used all those fundings for education, health, culture, and also nacionalized the financial institues.... And what? Costa Rica is the most advanced and greatest nation in Central America.

Some interesting links... Oh, and about the police, something I forgot to mention...

Those raids. Ok, they just round of gang members make a show, place them a day or two in prison and release the bulk of them because they don't have evidence of them committing a crime. Even if they served sentence, the prison centers of our country are an Academy for criminals to graduate. They've established their own "Mexican MAfia", and are able to conduct the crime spree of the country FROM INSIDE THE jails. Orchestrate thefts, order deaths, have contact with their mafia links (ARENA and Co.), and on and on. And don't believe that the guards control the prisons, recent protests should demonstrate that the prisons OWN their cells.

And another corrupt agency is aduanas. If anyone has followed close attention, the medicine that disappeared not long ago, was being distrbuted among them workers in there, and this isn't anything new. Anyway, because of this ARENA was forced to appear to be "competent" or face the ire of donating countries that never know the destiny of their donations or if they'll get there, they made a personnel shift. But will this stop this? No, just delays it until the new members get accostumed to their new locations and can resume their stealing...

Here Tim, check this interview of Michale Levine about the narcotraffic webbing that has been in operation in the region...

http://www.radionizkor.org/usa/

And it still persists, involving Cristiani, Calderon Sol, and Domenech.One bringing the drug using the Illopango airport, and the other two laundering the cash when they were the owners of the financial institutes of the country through illicit privitizacion.

So what do you propose, do you have a solution or just words in your mouth?Salvadorans that made it to the top (top = decent life, with economic capacity to have the basic needs fulfilled and spare some money in a few indulgements) are many, I've met many that made it inside the borders of El Salvador, working hard, and are not just those that did it during the 60s or 70s, some managed even during the 80s and definetily after the 90s. I do not mean the types like Silva, Perlas, Morales, etc., no I mean the real ones, and those have set an example.Your comments are too full of rage, you do not set an example nor lead anywhere ...it is just boring to try to read them.Change you writing style and focus a bit more, all right?.

For the same reason I do not read those "newspapers", my efforts to read your comments are set to a minimum.It is just pity to read the way in which you convey your messages, your mind is not brighter than that of the same people you criticize, the quality of your comments is only comparable to a comic book.The day you detach from your aggressiveness and become more rational then it will be nice to debate with you, since you seem to have potential.Have a nice day.

anonymous, I'm open for suggestions, because as is I'm ja-ja-jaded, and have actually lost hope.

Tell me, how to fight against a narco-mafia that:-Controls the military-Controls the police-Controls the whole media machine of the country-Hires hitmen, and maras for terrorist actions, killings, create disturbances-Controls every important organism in the government, from Corte Suprema de Justicia, Corte de Cuentas, MOG, MOP, etc. therefore keep an air-tight seal against any serious investigations.-Control the national assembly by doing under the table negotiations with PDC and PCN pawns.-Is financed and protected by the CIA/USA government on every illegal things they do.-Are part of a webbing that operates from Miami up to Venezuela. It is involved on arms dealing, narcotraffic and money laundery.

Tell me, what possibilities does this country have to overthrow all the traitors that staunch our country's progress? And make it quick, because every passing second them mafiosos are making every remaining state institute be more and more inept to privatize.

As I see it, our only chance was Handal, but even then, them FASCIST narco-mafiosos making the army the biggest financed institute would've shortly established a coup, and wouldn't give a hoot of opening fire on any protesters.

Me, I'm even getting sick of abiding by the law, when this government breaks every single one of them, and no international courts intervene thanks to USA meddling. So yes, as far as I'm concerned the only way to place Domenech, Cristiani, Hill, Flores, Sol, Perla, Prieto, Poma, Quiñonez, Torres in jail, and freeze their bank accounts and those of their family members... or just make them pay, is recurring to a country-wide coup or formally adopting anarchy (we are one step close, living under "la ley del machete"). This country is already a mess. People ALWAYS complain about the expensive life, of the corruption, of ANYTHING you can imagine, but ask those fools who they voted for? They'll say ARENA.

So, yes, my posts are filled with rage, but at least everything I posted is true. Can I at least get credit for it? Now tell me, how to fix the problem? Judging by Ferrer from Costa Rica (abolished the army in 1948, used all the funding from it in education, health, culture), I'd say El Salvador is 67 years too late for the path of betterness.

Speaking of newspapers, did anyone see LPG today? FOUR PAGES dedicated to Venezuela's attempt to make business in the region, and you have all the government mafiosos going "This is an attempt from the FMLN to desastibilize the country", "FMLN is planning to get weapons from Venezuela","FMLN has been financed by Venezuelan cash". Yet, what the damn newspapers don't say, is that Chavez since long ago as to fight the HIGH gas prices offered the Saca Pig gas for preferencial prices, of which he refused... Probably for the better, there is never any gurantees that anyone in the ARENA government won't steal/set gas prices at the pump to reflect the negotiation. But hey, they don't speak of how USA finances ARENA along with the CIA, or condemn their terror campaign as a way to sway votes (which OBVIOUSLY was the purpose)

Yeah, just look at Chanel 3 the Assembly thing, yesterday ARENA where raving mad about the anti-money laundery law. One can only wonder why they got like that... (not really)

So again, I ask you... Any ideas on what to do to straighten up something that has been for more than 50 years crooked?